share your favorite chili powder blends?

18 years ago

I have a plant loaded with serranos. They are way late this year. I have only used them to make fresh salsa in the past.

I also have a poblano chili which has produced some nice sized peppers.

The chili powder blends one finds in the stores are often boring, so would like to try making my own.

If you have any suggestions for making chili powder, would appreciate it.

Or other uses for my peppers. I'm a real neophyte when it comes to chilis.

Thanks.

Mary

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (9)

byron
18 years ago
Mary

It takes a little experince to decide what you like

My only suggestion is to experiment with small amounts, keep good notes, until you find a trend that you like...

After about 15 years of experimenting, I find like the
flavor of Aji's, still working with different combos
cmpman1974
18 years ago
I really like ripe jalapeno powder or orange thai pepper powder. I made about 17 varieties of hot pepper powder this year. Purira powder is quite tasty too!

Chris
Related Discussions
Chili- Ground chilis vs Chili powder, recommendation.
Q
Comments (16)
Ya... some confusion going on it seems. Chilie is a pepper. Chili is a dish. So in a literal sense you can have chilie powder made out of dried ground peppers. Now... to make the dish most in the U.S. consider chili you have to add a spice mixture know as "chili powder". As I recall Lars has a fondness for Mexico and lives in the South Western corner of the U.S. I'm not surprised that he would think of powdered peppers before a spice mixture. One of the things really interesting about his cooking is that he is doing different things with his food. Much as I'd love to sample Lar's cooking someday I'm going with Arley on the cumin. Cumin is the heart and soul of the dish we call Chili. My pot of chili often contains several kinds of hot peppers but it also takes a load of cumin. People walking into my home will exclaim in delight when I cook chili because of the fragrant cumin. I found whizzing my whole cumin seed in the blender with some tomatoes chops the cumin up pretty good. Not as good as hand chopping. My first lesson with cumin seed was to chop it up on a cutting board with a knife. Still strikes me as the best flavor. Our friends on the CF from India have recommended toasting the cumin... very good but I'm not 100% sold. The seed does require considerable cooking to release the oils that account for the intense flavor. The very best cumin I can purchase at the moment is bulk ground cumin from GFS which is a restaurant supply company. Tops even Penzey's whole seed. Still ground does not get the full spectrum of flavor so I add mostly ground GFS cumin and top note my flavor with some freshly chopped seed. Somehow ground cumin even when fresh and strong still does not have the high aromatic essence of whole seed. Chili powder often contains garlic that I've removed from my chili. Garlic is great and garlic is good but it is also sweet and not the character I want. Maybe sometimes it is alright.... I used to add sliced fresh garlic to my chili. Goodness that warms your entire body when the mood is there for it. Cilantro, in particular fresh cilantro provides an intense aromatic flavor and scent that many associate with north of the boarder "mexican" cooking. LOL!... sorry don't mean to go on so much. Chili is one of my favorite dishes. Fresh garden tomatoes are priceless if you want chili with star power. Different peppers add heat with different characters as Lars noted. Peppers at different stages of ripeness also display remarkably different characteristics. Green habeneras are not ripe but they are milder and have more tang then mature red habs. Then the amount of time a pepper cooks will change the flavor and heat profile of a pepper. My chili is tested and approved by Luna! Suppose I should admit I don't use chili powder in my chili. Not powdered peppers or any branded spice mix. Cumin and cilantro with hot peppers being part of the vegtable mix. I top coat much of my food with salt and black pepper and always do so with chili. : ) lyra
...See More
Got a cookie recipe that's your favorite to share?
Q
Comments (24)
linda117, I did a search and could not find one with egg in the dought. Sorry yours was dry. Pistachio Icebox cookie Pistachio cranberry icebox cookies MAKESABOUT 3 DOZEN COOKIES ACTIVE TIME:20 MIN START TO FINISH:2 1/2 HR Gourmet magazine, DECEMBER 2006 It doesn’t get fancier or more Christmassy than these glittery-edged cookies sporting studs of red and green. But all that festivity comes in an easy slice-and-bake package, so you can always keep a log of dough in the fridge, ready to go when company unexpectedly comes calling. This is just one of Gourmet’s Favorite Cookies: 1941-2008 [EDITED TO ADD: Sadly the link to this fabulous cookie collection is broken. I encourage you to go to the Gourmet website and retreive and print recipes you are interested in, before it goes away. Epicurious has many Gourmet recipe, thankfully, but the photos of the cookie recipes are fabulous and only available at Gourmet.com.] Although we’ve retested the recipes, in the interest of authenticity we’ve left them unchanged: The instructions below are still exactly as they were originally printed. 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon 1/4 teaspoon salt 1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar 1/2 teaspoon finely grated fresh orange zest 1/2 cup shelled pistachios (2 1/4 oz; not dyed red) 1/3 cup dried cranberries (1 1/4 oz) 1 large egg, lightly beaten 1/4 cup decorative sugar (preferably coarse) SPECIAL EQUIPMENT: parchment paper MAKE DOUGH: • Stir together flour, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl. • Beat together butter, granulated sugar, and zest in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture in 3 batches, mixing until dough just comes together in clumps, then mix in pistachios and cranberries. Gather and press dough together, then divide into 2 equal pieces. Using a sheet of plastic wrap or wax paper as an aid, form each piece of dough into a log about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Square off long sides of each log to form a bar, then chill, wrapped in plastic wrap, until very firm, at least 2 hours. SLICE AND BAKE COOKIES: • Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper. • Brush egg over all 4 long sides of bars (but not ends). Sprinkle decorative sugar on a separate sheet of parchment or wax paper and press bars into sugar, coating well. • Cut each bar crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices, rotating bar after cutting each slice to help keep square shape. (If dough gets too soft to slice, freeze bars briefly until firm.) Arrange cookies about 1/2 inch apart on lined baking sheets. • Bake cookies, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until edges are pale golden, 15 to 18 minutes total. Transfer cookies from parchment to racks using a slotted spatula and cool completely. COOKS’ NOTES: Dough bars can be chilled up to 3 days or frozen, wrapped in plastic wrap and then foil, 1 month (thaw frozen dough in refrigerator just until dough can be sliced). Cookies keep in an airtight container at room temperature 5 days. This post was edited by glenda_al on Mon, Mar 25, 13 at 12:22
...See More
Your Favorite Chili Recipe?
Q
Comments (18)
Several months ago I was looking for a chili recipe that would both WOW me and be safe to can for fast meals. I stumbled on this recipe for Texas Chili and it is perfect as written, no tweaking needed. Following is the recipe I like to use. Bear in mind that we like a lot of heat, and that heat will increase over time. This gets us about 7 quarts with a little bit leftover to sample. Texas Chili 2T of bacon grease or oil 4 medium yellow onions, chopped 6T chopped garlic 6T chili powder 4T paprika 2T cumin 4t dried oregano 2 pounds of ground beef 4t kosher salt 4 28oz cans of crushed tomatoes 30oz of cooked kidney beans- you can used canned beans+++ 30oz of cooked black turtle beans 2T minced chipotle chilis in adobo sauce Heat the grease in a large stock pot. Add the onions and garlic and cook until tender. Add the chili powder, paprika, cumin, and oregano and stir until the spices are well combined. Add the ground beef and 1t of the salt. Cook, stirring frequently until cooked through. 8-10 minutes. Stir in the remaining ingredients. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally. for 1 hour*. Adjust the seasonings with more salt or chipotle chilis if necessary. Serving suggestion: top with any one or all of the following: grated sharp white cheddar cheese, chopped white or green onions, sour cream, crumbled blue corn chips, chopped jalepeno chilis. Here is a link that might be useful: Texas Chili
...See More
Please share your favorite vegetable soup recipe!
Q
Comments (29)
Do you like cold soups, like gazpacho? I find it easy to make and delicious in the summer. Here goes: Garlic - About 6-7 cloves large onion - cut into chunks Campari tomatoes - about 1.5 pounds, peeled (note: for easy peeling, blanch the tomatoes with the skin lightly slit but leaving the tomato full and intact, dunk it in cold water and the skin should come off easily; can substitue Campari for other sweet flavorful tomatoes; it’s the quality and flavor of the tomatoes that makes the most difference) Fresh pickling cucumbers or English cucumbers - peeled and cut about a cup (I like the pickling kind because the tender ones don’t have to be de seeded; if it is the English cucumbers, make sure you either remove the seeds or that they are tender enough not to require removing the seeds) bell peppers - one cup, chopped with seeds removed (I like the gold and red peppers because they’re often fleshier and sweeter than the green) olive oil - half a cup balsamic vinegar - 1 tbsp salt - to taste (I like rock sea salt) ground black pepper - to taste blend everything except the olive oil in a blender until smooth; once the mixture is smooth, add the olive oil and blend for about 10 seconds (adding olive oil to the gazpacho rather than blending the oil into the gazpacho doesn’t have the same result) Optional- you can add a bit of mint or basil or any other seasoning you like. I like to add olde thompson’s Italian seasoning while blending.
...See More
svalli
18 years ago
Last year I ground everything what I had to powder and mixed them up. This year I have more varieties and I have made powders so that I have same family chiles in one powder.

I really like the mild habanero type chiles fresh and I made powder using them and an other powder with just C. baccatums.
Now I have Lemon Drops in the dehydrator and I am going to powder them just alone.

Most of all the powders I like the smoked one and I have to make more of it this weekend. For it I have used all sorts of ripe peppers. I smoke them only 6 hours, but it still has a nice smoky aroma and the powder is reddish brown in color.
maryinpnw
Original Author
18 years ago
Thanks for answering my question. There is a family farm stand I frequent this time of year. They grow many pepper varieties. I will have to buy an assortment the next time I'm there and experiment.

Mary
John__ShowMe__USA
18 years ago
Made lots and lots of different individual powders here, but the blends am still experimenting on.

Smoking peppers for powder.. very easy to smoke too much. My advice is to use only a small amount of a mild wood like apple or pecan to start with. Keep smoker as cool as possible so as to not cook the pods or gas off the capsaicin. I then finish in a dehydrator set at max 125Â°F. I & others on this forum know some chile-heads that can smoke dry large amounts of pods in their off-set firebox smokers and never get bitterness or too much smoke even with stronger woods like hickory. Mesquite takes even more practice as can easily overpower.

The majority of my powders are not smoked and are a single species/variety simply dried and ground up. Lemon Drop (baccatum) is by far my most popular powder either lightly pecan smoked or plain.

Blends.. Can't go wrong with mild & flavorful annuums such as the New Mex, ancho, cubanelle, Spanish Spice and particularly Pasilla types. Then add hotter chinense or pubescens to the mix. Baccatums are absolutely wonderful in combinations. Don't stop with just adding capsicums. Dried and powdered cantaloupe, watermelon, onions, garlic, Mexican oregano, thyme, bay, basil, sage, carrots & tamarind beans have all made it into some of my concoctions. At this very moment have a tray of sliced mushrooms drying for adding to a blend.

And don't forget pickled peppers. Bought an institutional size can of sliced pickled green jals once and everyone absolutely loved the powder. I refrigerator pickle a lot of home-grown C. pubescens and get a very tasty, unique powder from them.

And I really like Byron's advice: > My only suggestion is to experiment with small amounts, keep good notes, until you find a trend that you like...

jt
byron
18 years ago
Mary

If you look at the store bought you will find that there are added ingredients, Cumin(?) being a biggie.

Byron
dereckbc
18 years ago
I know this will sound boring but will spit it out anyway. I mix ripe Nu-Mex (Big Jims), Pablano, and Jalapeno (Biker Billy). I let them all ripen then just dry them in my harvester. The Nu-Mex and Pablano give it s sweet smoky raisen flavor, and the Jalapeno gives it the bite (My Biker Billy's are devilishly hot).

I know it sounds boring, but it wins in small town chili cook-offs, and earns honorable mentions in regional cook-offs.
John__ShowMe__USA
18 years ago
Dereck,

Doesn't sound boring at all. If a combo works, it works! I could never grow Biker Billy jals that had any heat. Shows what an idiot I am.

jt
dereckbc
18 years ago
JT said:
" I could never grow Biker Billy jals that had any heat".

Wow first time I have heard of that. My two favs are Biker Billy and Mucho Nacho. Both have always been very hot, hotter than say a Thai Dragon. Curious what part of the country you live in? Does it get hot and dry for several months? Humid, arrid, cool nights, lots of rain?

share your favorite chili powder blends?

Comments (9)

byron

cmpman1974

Related Discussions

svalli

maryinpnw
Original Author

JohnShowMeUSA

byron

dereckbc

JohnShowMeUSA

dereckbc

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

share your favorite chili powder blends?

Comments (9)

Related Discussions

maryinpnwOriginal Author

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

maryinpnw
Original Author